


Permission to Dream

by BlueJay_Silvertongue



Category: Wonder Woman (2017)
Genre: Angst, College AU, Community College, F/F, TWs inside, it's 2010
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-02
Updated: 2018-01-02
Packaged: 2019-02-26 14:31:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13237713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueJay_Silvertongue/pseuds/BlueJay_Silvertongue
Summary: Diana Prince meets Isabel Maru in a writing class during her first year at college. She's the only person who knows where Themyscira is.





	Permission to Dream

**Author's Note:**

  * For [miss_belivet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/miss_belivet/gifts).



> This story is a modern take on WonderPoison and there are parts of Isabel's backstory and plotline that are pretty unpleasant, so _please,_ if you are not up for reading a story that involves self-harm or hospitals or homophobia or estranged parents or mortality, PLEASE do not keep reading.

The first time Diana sees her, she’s sitting in the hallway, back against the wall, knees drawn up to her chest, her nose buried in a book, talking to no one. There are others, too: men and women clutching cups and thermoses full of hot coffee, their bleary eyes staring at their phones. More than a few eyes rise when Diana steps forward to double check the classroom number, but not one person speaks. The hall is silent almost as if a rule, but it is the first day of class, after all, and it _is_ 7:30 in the morning.

She doesn’t notice when the professor calls _Isabel Maru._ There are too many names, too many people. She does notice when the young man in front of her passes back the stack of syllabuses and offers her a smile that seems kind.

“This is a writing _emphasis_ class, and that means you are expected to _write._ And all written assignments need to be typed. If you don’t have your own computer, there are labs throughout campus for you to use…”

By the time the professor is finished calling roll for the 30 person class and going through the syllabus, the clock is showing 8:05.

“All right, now I want you to get into groups of three or four, introduce yourselves, share why you’re taking this class, and one interesting thing about yourself.”

Diana looks nervously around at the students grunting amongst themselves as they shift their desk chairs.

“It’s okay, we’ll move around you,” the young man in front of her says, smiling at her uncertainty. Diana smiles back, then glances at the girl scooting her chair up to join their group.

“I hate these things,” she grumbles.

“The chairs? Or the ice breakers?” he laughs, and the girl rolls her eyes.

 _“Everything,_ Steve. Who the fuck has energy for small talk at seven in the morning?!” she snaps, then she waves an impatient hand at the figure sitting behind Diana’s chair. “You, girl- why are you so quiet back there? Pull up your chair.”

The woman sitting behind Diana looks petrified for a moment, then her face settles into a smirk. She leans forward without comment, without moving her chair even an inch closer.

“Okay. So- name, why we’re in this class, and a fun fact,” Steve says, ticking off his fingers as he reads off of his scrawled notes. “Um, I guess I’ll go first: I’m Steve, I’m taking this class because it’s required, and I’m in the Aeronautics program.”

“You call that a fun fact?!”

“Shuttup, Etta.”

The girl cackles, then leans back in her chair, squinting over at the chalkboard.

“Dude, I have the notes written down right he-” Steve begins, gesturing wildly at his notebook.

“I’m Etta,” she says, ignoring him. “And… oh, that’s right. I’m in this class because all of the other sections of Writing 100 were full, and this dummy told me he had signed up for this one, and we come up on the same bus anyway, so I’ve gotta suffer through this shit for a whole semester-”

“That’s great, thank you, Etta. And you?” Steve interrupts, turning to Diana.

“Oh, no- it’s her turn,” Diana says, reaching out and laying a hand on the strange woman’s arm. She tenses visibly.

“My name is Isabel Maru,” she says, subtly brushing off Diana’s hand. Her fingers are cold. “This class is required for me to graduate.”

Steve and Diana stare at her for a moment (Etta has pulled out her cell phone), but it’s clear she’s not going to say anything more, and Steve turns to Diana and smiles.

 _“Now_ it’s your turn.”

“Okay, I’m Diana. I’m taking this class because the advisor told me to take it, and I’m new.”

“Great, we are too,” Steve says, gesturing to himself and his distracted friend. “Where did you go to high school?”

“I’m- I’m an international student,” Diana says, trying to sound nonchalant, but wincing at how awkward the words seem. No one seems to notice. Isabel is staring at her notes from the class, Etta is staring at her phone, and Steve smiles again and asks where she’s from.

“I’m from Themyscira. It’s an island in the Aegean Sea,” she adds quickly when no sign of recognition crosses Steve’s face.

“Cool. No, that’s great. So, why did you decide to come here?”

“Oh my god, look at what my friend commented on my status,” Etta interrupts, holding out her phone to her friend. Steve leans over to look, then snorts. Diana blinks, then glances at Isabel. The woman is staring at her with dark eyes, and her mouth is curled slightly into a smile that is almost unkind.

“Isn’t Themyscira technically considered part of Greece?”

Diana stares at her in disbelief, her mouth open, but no sound coming out. Then she shakes her head and says,

“Well, it was, but we won our independence from Greece centuries ago, and now we’re considered an island country. I can’t believe you’ve heard of it!” Diana says. Isabel shrugs, but doesn’t reply.

“Are you fr-” Diana begins, but then the professor calls the class back into order, and Isabel quickly pulls away, her face hidden as she looks down at her notebook.

“-and I think I should just unfriend him, I mean, really-”

“Hey- class,” Steve interrupts, nudging his friend and then resettling into his seat. He glances back at Diana and smiles. She shrugs, then smiles back.

 

* * *

 

“I met a woman today who knew where Themyscira is.”

Hippolyta sweeps up her hair and grins, two bobby pins between her teeth. It’s five in the morning on the island, and the Queen is still in her dressing gown.

“We are not _that_ obscure-”

“I don’t know, I haven’t met anyone else who’s heard of it,” Diana says, poking suspiciously at her bowl of food.

“What did you get for dinner?”

“I went to the market across the street. The man behind the counter suggested the gnocchi and tomato soup.”

 _“Please,_ Diana, did you move to America or Italy?”

“Tomorrow I’m going to try the sushi place downstairs,” Diana goes on, ignoring her mother’s criticism. “And there’s a crêperie, and a deli, and a Chinese restaurant, and a coffee house, and a Mexican-”

“Tell her to remember to keep up with her training while she’s doing all this eating,” a voice off-camera says, and Diana squints at the screen.

_“Antiope?!”_

“I told you she’d want to see your face,” Hippolyta says, patting her finished hairdo and frowning to her left. There is the sound of a heavy sigh, then Antiope’s tired face appears on the screen.

“Hello, child.”

“You’re up so early. I’m impressed,” Diana says, but she grins and blows her aunt a kiss.

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“Really? You slept through your alarm the last two times,” Hippolyta says dryly, rising and walking off camera to her wardrobe. Antiope rolls her eyes and moves to sit in her sister’s seat.

“So. Tell me everything.”

 

* * *

 

On the second day of Writing 100, the professor asks the class to move their tables into a circle. Etta grumbles. Steve rolls his eyes. Isabel says nothing. But now that they’re in a circle, Diana can see her: the dark, long-sleeve shirts she wears no matter the temperature outside, the curious watch she wears on her left hand, the way her hair is constantly getting in her eyes, the way she props one elbow up on her desk and rests her head against her palm, her left hand moving rapidly across the pages of her notebook, her right hand gripping a fistful of thick, dark hair. She writes in cursive. Etta writes in print. Steve writes in block letters when he takes notes at all. Diana types on her laptop.

After Labor Day, the class is given their first essay assignment. Steve hands Diana the stack of rubrics, and Diana frowns as she turns to the empty chair next to her. Isabel hadn’t shown up to class, and the professor had muttered _Isabel Maru… oh, right_ during roll call.

“I want you to think about your lives. Think about a time when your own story intersected with the narrative of a larger narrative, the narrative of society, family, or community. And I want you to write about your story, and the ethical choices that arose from that intersection of the conflicting narratives. This is your life story, and how it’s been affected for better or for worse by these larger stories.”

Etta is already grumbling about the stupidity of the prompt before the class has ended. Diana shakes her head, amused, as they're pushing their chairs out of the circle and into the normal configuration, then Steve rounds on his friend and says,

“Dude, just write about _any_ one of your dating experiences.”

“I’m not going to relive any of that shit just for-”

“For the sake of ART. For the GRADE,” he says, waving his arms grandly and almost hitting a man in the face.

“Oops, sorry.”

“No worries, man.”

“Watch what you’re doing, Steve,” Diana teases and he grins.

“Hell, I’ll just make something up,” Etta says, too loudly in the nearly empty room. The professor glances up and gives a knowing smile.

“I know it’s a fairly complicated prompt, but I think you’ll enjoy writing it once you get into it.”

“I’m sure I will,” Etta says, rolling her eyes. But her cheeks are red as she hurries out of the classroom. Steve turns to look at Diana and smiles, gesturing her ahead of him.

“Ladies first.”

“You go ahead, I want to talk with...” Diana replies, nodding towards the front desk. Steve looks disappointed, but shuffles out after saying a quiet,

“Oh. Okay. Bye, then.”

Diana walks up to the front of the classroom. Her stomach is twisted up in nerves, and she doesn't understand why.

“Diana- what can I do for you? Question about the prompt?” The professor sounds tired. Maybe his morning coffee still hadn’t kicked in yet.

“No, I…” Diana glances at the empty room behind them, then goes on. “I was just wondering about the girl who sits next to me… Isabel. She wasn’t here today, and I was wondering if I should send her the notes from today’s class.”

“That would be great, she already has the handouts from today, I think I emailed all of those to her, and the prompt is on d2l, but I’m sure she’d appreciate your notes.”

Diana smiles as she leaves.

She’s still smiling when she arrives at her next class.

 

* * *

 

_Hi Isabel,_

_We missed you in class today! Here are the notes from the lecture. Please let me know if you have any questions!_

_Sincerely,_

_Diana_

 

Diana frowns and deletes _Sincerely._ She decided from the beginning that _Love, Diana_ was not going to work as a closer, besides, she doesn’t _love_ her, she’s just a classmate. But _Sincerely_ sounds too stuffy and formal. Also, the safe use of _we_ almost makes the phase sound the opposite of sincere, but what is she going to say, _I missed you today_ or _I looked for you, and you weren’t there, where were you?_

Diana groans and replaces _Sincerely_ with _Thanks_ and then hits send.

And then she stares at her inbox for a good two hours, waiting for a reply.

 

* * *

 

_Hello, Diana,_

_Thank you for the notes. They were very helpful. See you in class._

_Isabel_

_\--_

_Isabel Maru_

_Chemical Technology A.S._

_Peer Tutor: CHEM 300, 400, 401, 410_

 

“Why are you smiling?”

“Nothing. I just got an email.”

“...an interesting email?”

“Not really.”

Hippolyta makes some sort of amused sound and Diana finally tears her eyes away from her inbox and looks at her mother’s laughing face through the screen.

“What?”

 _“You._ You look like you just won the lottery,” Hippolyta says, her mouth curling into a sly smile. “I’m not going to find out who this email’s from, am I?”

“She’s just a student in my English class.” _A smart, scientist, peer tutor student._

“Oh, good, ‘she’. I thought it might have been that pilot fellow you’re always studying with.”

“What? Oh, _Steve?_ No!”

 

* * *

 

“All right, has everyone handed in their rough drafts? Any more rough drafts? Okay, the peer review sheets should be going around. You’re going to fill that out when you’re done reviewing your classmate’s paper, and you’re also going to make notes on the draft itself. Remember, the point of the peer review is to give constructive criticism: we’re not here to insult or judge…”

“Don’t insult or judge anyone, Diana,” Steve says under his breath, handing her the stack of papers.

“I never do,” she replies, taking one and handing the rest to Isabel. The woman raises an eyebrow. Diana stares at her for a moment too long, unsure if she’s about to say something. But she doesn’t, and Diana looks away again, trying to ignore the blush creeping up her cheeks.

“Leave the woman alone,” Etta mutters from the other side of Steve. “She’s doing her best.”

_“Leave Britney alone!”_

“It. Is. Seven in the _morning,”_ Etta hisses, taking the essay the professor is handing to her. He looks shocked. “Oh! No, not you, oh my god, I’m sorry, I wasn’t talking to you, I was talking to Steve...”

Steve rolls his eyes, picks up his pen, and looks down at the essay that had just been set onto his desk. Diana does the same, and her heart drops into her stomach when she sees the name written at the top.

 

* * *

 

_I remember my first time at the doctor’s. The exam table was so tall, my mother had to lift me onto it, and then we sat in silence in the white room, staring at the cupboards, staring at the magazines in their slots on the wall, staring at the shiny silver sink and its little cup dispenser above it, staring at the distant, distant floor. The wax paper crinkled underneath my swinging legs until my mother told me to stop._

_The first person to come in was the nurse. She gave me six shots, and I watched each one. The prick of the needle didn’t match the pushing motion she made with her thumb, and I was so confused, I forgot to cry. The nurse was so impressed, she gave me a six stickers instead of one, and said she was proud of me for being brave._

_My mother was the first person I saw, the second time I went to the hospital. But this time, she was the one crying. When I woke up, the nurses held me down and made me drink a cup of ground charcoal, and then they told her I was ready to be moved to the psychiatric hospital. She clutched my hand and asked me why, over and over and over again. I was too busy gagging on the aftertaste of charcoal to answer her…_

 

Diana pauses and looks at Isabel out of the corner of her eyes. She’s doing that thing, that _thing_ with one hand buried deep in her hair, the other hand holding a pen that has been scribbling nonstop over the essay she’s editing. She’s wearing glasses. Diana has never seen her wearing glasses before.

Steve clears his throat and Diana jumps. She quickly goes back to reading, ignoring Etta’s soft shushing noise.

 

_...It wasn’t until months later that the test results came back, and they were positive. I stared at the doctor, and couldn’t seem to react. But what do you do, when your own blood is poisoning your body?_

_...months in the hospital. There’s nothing quite like a hospital ceiling to make you consider the futility of life…_

_The day they told me it was gone, that everything was done, I went home and cried. I had fought, and I had won. If nothing else, I had this: my life. The thing I once considered worthless, the thing I once tried to destroy..._

_I have never given myself permission to dream: to wonder of the future, of a time when I will have the freedom to do what I want. But one day, my country will not dictate to me who I may love. One day, my society will no longer tell me what field of study a woman can pursue. One day, my family will hear my voice, and they will listen. One day, I will find my path, through life and death, dark and light, science and faith, sickness and health- and I will follow it. And on that day, I will rise, no longer weighed down by the narratives have been written to mold me, to subdue me._

_And I will begin to write my own._

 

* * *

 

“I just wanted to say, I love your essay.”

Class is over. Isabel doesn’t look at her as she snatches the paper from her hands. And she keeps staring at her desk, even after she’s shoved the marked-up essay into her bag.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes.”

“I really did like it a lot. You’re really…” _Brave,_ she wants to say, but she remembers the opening paragraph, the nurse, the stickers- and she doesn’t. Isabel seizes her things and practically runs from the classroom.

And Diana sits back, watching her leave, her head swimming.

 

* * *

 

Isabel is absent for the two classes after mid-semester break. Diana sends her the lecture notes and gets the same polite reply in response.

Steve asks her if she’s okay, and Etta gives them both a sharp glance, then says,

“It’s the season.”

“What?”

“The time of year. The changing seasons. It’ll be alright.”

And then the professor starts the lecture, and Diana doesn’t know what she meant until she steps outside and stares up at the dark, low-hanging clouds.

She goes back to her apartment that evening and sits at the window, a bowl of soup in hand, and watches as the people walk around with their brightly colored umbrellas, as the cars speed by, windshield wipers on, water spraying up behind their wheels.

But she likes the rain. She likes how it makes her feel: small and lonely and warm and pensive.

She wonders if Isabel Maru feels the same way.

 

* * *

 

The second English assignment is a persuasive essay, and Steve is unfortunate enough to get Isabel as his peer editor.

“Jesus Christ, _look_ at this!” he complains, flipping through the pages of his heavily edited essay as they leave class. Diana glances behind them, but Isabel has stayed behind to talk with the professor.

“Serves you right, didn’t you write it like, last night?” Etta snaps.

“Hey, I worked hard on this draft-”

“For about thirty minutes-”

“And listen to this! _If you are going to appeal to pathos, you would benefit from knowing your audience beforehand. This statement shows that you do not._ Who does she think she is, the fucking TA?”

“She just knows her stuff, what’s your prob-” Etta begins.

“She's so weird. Like one of those traditional, Old Country crone types.”

“Excuse me? Old country _what?!_ ”

“Well, sorry, Etta, stereotypes exist!”

“She’s a grouchy bitch, not some _bird_ -”

“Shush, Etta, _goddamn,_ speaking of stereotypes-”

“Guys!” Diana hisses, nudging them as Isabel pushes past them in the hall. Steve and Etta freeze, waiting for some retaliation, but the small woman continues walking away without a backwards glance. Diana hesitates, then breaks into a run, chasing her down.

“Isabel, wait!”

The woman doesn’t stop, and Diana finally catches up with her and lays a hand on her arm. Isabel startles and glances up at her, apparently noticing her for the first time.

“I’m sorry.”

“What?” she says blankly.

“About my friends. I’m sorry.”

“What did they do?”

“They…” Diana’s voice trails off, but she sees the gleam in Isabel’s eyes, and she knows what the woman is doing. She knows she’s being tested. “They were calling you names. They don’t really mean it-”

“Don’t they?” Isabel snorts, turning away and continuing to walk once more.

“No,” Diana says, her long strides keeping up easily with the older woman’s scuttling steps. “They’re just being silly. They say things they don’t mean. But they don’t mean to be hurtful.”

“I’m not capable of being _hurt_ by a few glorified college freshmen running their mouths.”

“Of course you are,” Diana says, and she’s bewildered by the anger that flares in Isabel’s eyes at her words. “I mean, it doesn’t matter who it is, it’s still hurtful when people say unkind things about you.”

Isabel stares at her for a moment, then her lip curls.

“Is it hurtful to _you?_ When your people say… _unkind_ things about me?”

Diana’s face scrunches with confusion. “Well. Yes, I suppose.”

Isabel smirks, then shifts the heavy messenger bag on her shoulder. Her knuckles are white.

_“Good.”_

And then she turns sharply and flounces away, leaving Diana in the middle of the hallway, staring at her until she disappears into the crowd.

 

* * *

 

“So, how did it go yesterday?”

Diana looks up from her history notes. She and Steve are sitting in the student center. There’s a group of students in the corner playing some complicated looking card game and listening to songs on their phones. Other students are scattered throughout the wide, open room: studying, talking, watching movies on their laptops, sleeping with their heads resting atop their backpacks.

“How did what go?”

Steve pulls a stack of books and papers from his bag and drops them down onto the table with a thump.

“Your conversation with that woman who is NOT a bird,” Steve says, sounding suspiciously uninterested.

“It was… fine?”

“She didn’t bite your head off and tell you to leave her the fuck alone?”

“What? _No,”_ Diana says incredulously, staring at his frowning face. “What’s your problem with her, anyway?”

“I don’t have a problem with her.”

Diana frowns and looks at him, and he squirms under her disapproving gaze, then at last he mumbles without looking up from his notebook,

“She’s just… weird. And a bit creepy. And she watches you.”

“What?”

“She watches you. In class, when she thinks you’re not looking. She…”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“It means she likes you.”

“So?”

“It means she _likes_ you.” Steve stares at her, then sighs in frustration when she doesn’t react. “It means she’s _gay,_ Diana.”

Diana’s mouth falls open, then she closes it, then she opens it again.

“Well, I guess that changes everything then, doesn’t it?” she says, and her voice is so tight, it’s a wonder Steve even hears it. Some odd strain is running through her, and she doesn’t know if it’s rage or adrenaline, but she can feel her heart pounding, the blood rushing to her head as she stands.

“Does it?” Steve asks, looking at her, his expression wary.

“No, Steve, it does _not!”_ Diana snaps, reaching across the table, fumbling with her books, trying to shove them all at once into her bag.

“Diana, wait- is this about the- because I have _nothing_ against them, honestly, I’ve had gay friends before-”

“I’m _sure_ you have,” Diana hisses, pulling on her bag and shoving her chair so hard against the table that it scrapes a few inches across the floor.

“Diana-”

“And by the way, Isabel is not the _only_ one who has been watching; _I’ve_ also been watching _her.”_ Diana snatches her water bottle from the table and swings around to face Steve’s shocked face. “And do you know what else? _I like what I see.”_

And then she strolls away, walking as fast as she can towards the glass double doors, blindly ignoring Steve’s calls for her to come back.

 

* * *

 

The science department is housed in one of the oldest buildings on campus, and it shows in the worn brick walls, the huge, nonfunctional windows, the crumbling sidewalks. The building is an L shape, and in its crook is an area with picnic tables and trees and grass that barely hides the mess of tangled roots running through the dirt underneath. At some point, they had put down concrete slabs in an attempt to provide a safe, trip-free path to the tables, but tell-tale cracks are already beginning to show.

But _she’s_ there, sitting alone, feet dangling, absently eating grapes from a ziplock bag as she writes slowly across the pages of a book.

“Isabel?”

The book shuts.

“What do you want?”

The tone is brusque, but Isabel’s expression is more curious than hostile as she looks up at her.

“I… may I sit with you?”

Isabel just looks at her, then glances around the courtyard, apparently thinking this is a prank.

“It’s not a trick, I just want to talk with you,” Diana says. Her hands are gripping the straps of her backpack so tightly, her palms are starting to hurt.

“I suppose. But only because it’s you,” Isabel finally replies, gesturing to the opposite side of the table. Diana pulls off her backpack, flexes her stiff fingers, and sits. Isabel stares at her, and Diana stares back, then the older woman raises an eyebrow and says,

“What did you think of yesterday’s class?”

“I liked it. I love when he talks about the different appeals of rhetoric, like, I feel like I’ll look for those all the time now.”

Isabel shrugs and reaches for another grape. Diana watches as it travels from the shiny bag on the table to her pink lips, how her fingers linger a moment by her mouth after she bites down.

“What?”

Diana blinks. “What?”

“Why are you staring like that, are you hungry, did you not eat?”

“No, it's just, you have cute lips,” Diana says without thinking, then she feels her face grow red as those lips part in shock, then twist into a disbelieving smile.

“Are you serious?” Isabel is grinning openly now, and Diana feels her heart give a lurch. _Not now, not now, not now,_ she berates it, but Isabel continues talking, apparently unaware that her table-mate is having a heart attack. “Who put you up to this? You can’t let them use you like that, just because you’re gullible-”

“No one put me up to anything, what are you talking about?”

 _“You._ Why are you sitting here? Why did you come find me? You don’t have any classes in this building.”

“Because I- wait, how do you know I don’t have any classes in this building? You know my class schedule?”

Isabel stares at her, apparently unimpressed. But she doesn’t answer the question.

“You seem like a very nice person,” she says instead, rising and plucking her bag of grapes from the table. “But you don’t know the first thing about me. And _I_ for one think it would be best to keep it that way.”

“But I do know you.”

Isabel freezes. “Excuse me?”

“From your essay. I still remember what you wrote, you said you want to find your own path, and rise and fly.”

Isabel scoffs, but her cheeks are slightly pink as she looks away.

“I didn’t say anything about _flying.”_

“Look,” Diana reaches across the table. Isabel is too far away to touch, but Diana leaves her hand there, outstretched towards her. “I… I want to know more about you. I want to know you.”

Isabel picks up her messenger bag and comes around to Diana’s side of the table. Her expression hasn’t changed.

“Why?”

“Why what?”

Isabel tosses her bags onto the table once more and runs a hand through Diana’s hair. Her touch is casual, nonchalant. Experimental. But Diana shivers and leans in anyway. She’s so close, she can smell the detergent Isabel uses to wash her clothes.

“You’re weird.” Isabel’s voice is soft. Almost a murmur. A tender murmur. Diana dares a glance up at her, and Isabel tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. Her fingers linger a moment against her cheek before she pulls her hand away.

“...and you’re not?” Diana asks, barely daring to breathe. Isabel smirks.

“Diana of Themyscira,” she says, almost as if to herself. Then she looks down, takes one of Diana’s shaking hands in her own, and presses a wet grape into it.

“What’s this?” Diana says, staring down. And this time, Isabel laughs aloud.

“It’s called a grape, _Princesa._ ”

And then she’s swung her bag onto her shoulder, and she’s strolling away, carefully picking her way across the crumbling concrete slabs to the entrance of the building.

Diana watches her go. And then she eats the grape.

It’s sweet.

 

* * *

 

That night, Diana stops by the natural foods market for her dinner, and the man behind the counter at the deli grins at her and waves. It’s already a quarter past seven by the time she’s made it into her apartment and nudging the door closed with one foot, her salad and bowl of mac and cheese in one hand, and a bottle of ginger ale in the other. She barely has enough time to wash her face and change into a pair of silky pajamas when she hears the telltale sound of an incoming call on Skype.

“Coming!” she calls as she hurries out of the bathroom, even though she knows her mother can’t hear her. Hippolyta is waiting impatiently when Diana finally reaches her computer and clicks the mouse.

The Queen of Themyscira doesn’t comment on her being late, but she does raise her eyebrows and say,

“So you talked to her.”

Diana immediately busies herself with opening her bottle of ginger ale. Hippolyta laughs, clearly unconvinced.

“What did she say?”

“What?” Diana asks, fumbling with the lid of her mac and cheese now, trying to think back to the last time she’d mentioned Isabel Maru to her mother.

“That _woman_ you’ve been mooning over all semester. What did she say?”

“She gave me a grape,” Diana says, lifting a forkful of cheesy noodles into her mouth.

“...is that some sort of local dating tradition?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Was it sour?”

Diana laughs. “No, it was normal tasting. Anyways, how would she know? It’s not like she took a bite of it first.”

Hippolyta stares at her for a moment, her gaze cool and assessing, and Diana tries to not squirm. Even from thousands of miles away, her mother can still read her better than anyone else in the world, and that fact is both comforting and unsettling.

“Is she a good person?” Her voice is not overexcited, but it is not disapproving enough that Diana can accuse her of being unsupportive.

“She’s…” Diana pauses, thinking of how many times she had glanced over at her studious classmate in the middle of a lecture, watching those dark eyes as they scanned a half-filled page in her notebook, as they stared up at the professor, at whoever was speaking in the circle. Or all the little habits she’d noticed: the way the woman would twirl her pen in her hand when she was thinking, the way she bit her lip when someone asked a philosophical question, the way she crossed her ankles underneath the desk, the way those curls of hair always came loose and drooped over her forehead, no matter how many times she swept them back.

“You’re completely in love, child,” Hippolyta says after a long silence has passed with Diana just staring into space. “But with _what?_ Why her?”

“I…” Diana begins, then she forces herself to speak when Hippolyta sighs impatiently. “I like her. I think she’s smart. She keeps to herself, she’s not outwardly expressive, not like Steve or Etta. And she wrote such a beautiful essay, and she’s a fighter, she fought her sickness and beat it, and now she’s a scientist, and when she looks at me, I…”

Hippolyta sighs again as Diana’s voice trails off.

“Does she like you?”

“I don't know. I _think_ so. Or maybe I just hope so. I think I have to prove it to her. Like, she won’t give me the time of day unless I show her that I mean it, that I’m not just messing with her. I… I feel like life has done that to her a lot.”

And Hippolyta finally rolls her eyes.

“What?” Diana protests, putting down her salad.

“Leave it to you, Diana, to find the most melodramatic woman on the entire college campus-”

“She’s not melodramatic, she’s just serious!” Diana exclaims.

“Well, make sure it’s not _too_ serious too soon, do you understand? I know you said she’s older, but you’re still in _college._ There will be plenty of time for serious relationships later.”

Diana swallows back a retort of, _I don’t want a serious relationship later, I want one now,_ and changes the subject by asking about the harvest. Her mother relents and spends the rest of their conversation talking about the plans for the celebrations while Diana finishes her dinner.

 

* * *

 

It turns out the United States also has a harvest festival, although very little indication of harvesting is present in the city. The trees blaze with gold and orange fire, but there are no reapers, no wagons full of freshly harvested grain and fruit displayed in the town square (there are still the weekend farmers markets, but nothing grand or special to celebrate the reaping of the autumn crops). However, there _is_ a holiday called Thanksgiving, which Etta brings to Diana’s attention when she invites her over to her family’s house for the celebratory meal.

“What is a Thanksgiving?”

“It’s the worst, it’s when Squanto brought food to the pilgrims so then they didn’t starve, and then they went on to forget all about it when they slaughtered all of the Native Americans, or something arather.”

“There’s actually some debate on whether Squanto was actually present at the first Thanksgiving-”

“Shut up, white boy, no one asked you,” Etta snaps, and Steve laughs a bit too hard. After their argument, Steve had texted Diana a long apology and a story about a gay cousin and his working on being more open-minded, and Diana had graciously forgiven him. (It had been easier to forgive him over text, as opposed to now. According to Etta, he had been smoking with a group of friends in the parking lot before class, and he is now crazy.)

“Anyways, you should come over. We’re having turkey and mashed potatoes and shit, and my mom likes thinking that I’m popular and have actual friends.”

“You’re having shit?” Steve asks, and then he ducks as Etta waves a hand in his direction.

“Seriously, how _high_ are you?! Just because it’s a holiday weekend- you know what, never mind. Anyways, Diana, are you up for it, or are you spending Thanksgiving in the lab with that birdy friend of yours?”

“I… don’t know what she’s doing. We haven’t really…”

“Well, you don’t have to decide now. You can probably just show up if you want, we literally live a couple blocks from the bus station, and they’ll be running on the Sunday schedule, but as long as you get there, someone can drive you back up here. ”

“You know Lady Bird Johnson was actually way more popular with the public than Lyndon B., but-” Steve begins, and Etta groans and rounds on him.

“Shut up. Shut up. Shut _up.”_

 

* * *

 

“What are you doing on Thanksgiving?”

They’ve walked out of class together in silence.  But this time Isabel doesn’t walk away as they step into the bright sunlight.

“Me?” Isabel asks, squinting at her. Diana stares back, resisting the urge to gather the smaller woman into her arms and squeeze her as tight as she can.

“Yes, you,” she replies, trying to not sound too exasperated.

“Working.”

“Working?”

“In the lab.”

“But it’s the harvest, you’re suppose to eat and celebrate.”

“I’ll buy myself a carton of eggnog and keep it in the freezer.”

“But… it will freeze.”

And Isabel laughs and smiles that sweet smile that makes Diana swear that God is alive, then she leans forward, kisses Diana’s cheek, and walks away.

And Diana stares after her, now convinced not only that God is alive, but also Jesus H. Christ and Mary and Joseph as well.

 

* * *

 

According to Etta’s family, Thanksgiving is a merry affair with plenty: plenty of people crammed into one house, and plenty of food spread out over an entire normal-sized table, the kitchen counters, and another smaller table in the dining room. There’s the turkey and the mashed potatoes as promised, but apparently when Etta said “shit”, she meant five other types of potatoes (as well as sweet potatoes), three different casseroles, biscuits, cornbread, baked mac and cheese, corn, collard greens, candied yams, over a dozen or so dishes with just meat, and a _mountain_ of stuffing. And then there are plates and tins of cookies and eight different pies and five different buckets of ice cream (Diana listens politely as one of Etta’s uncles explains why vanilla is the only flavor ice cream to eat _with_ a dessert) and cakes and pastries and pudding...

And then there are people everywhere: in the kitchen, in the family room, in the living room, on the patio, on the staircase, in the bathroom- one of the cousins yells _Fire!_ as a prank, but no one hears him over the din. Etta grins at Diana’s overwhelmed face, takes the pie from her hands, replaces it with a plate, and when it is filled with food, she pulls her outside.

“Welcome to the kid’s table.”

“Kids, aka teens, college students, thirty-year-olds…”

“Yeah, when we’re old enough, we get to move up in the world and sit _inside.”_

“Really, _where?_ On top of your mother?!”

“Dude, shut your mouth, there’s _kids_ out here _-”_

It is so unlike the autumn feasts on Themyscira, but as Diana eats her food and chats with Etta’s cousins and siblings, and as various generations of family and friends make their way outside to say hello and enthusiastically give their two cents to the group discussion, she is reminded painfully of home. Her aunts, shouting at each other over long tables, her mother ordering more wine (to the delight of the Amazons), warriors making toast after toast to their fearless Queen, and their unmatched general. On Themyscira there was warmth and closeness, like there is here, now.

It feels like the night could go on forever, or at least for several more hours. But Diana glances at her watch as the little children are being bundled in their coats and herded towards the door, and Etta turns to look at her as she blows out a puff of smoke. And she smiles, passes the joint off to her cousin, and then says knowingly,

“Take some food for her.”

 

* * *

 

The hallway is dark, but she sees a light on under one of the doors. The warm smells from the three different tupperwares of food Etta’s mom had given her wafts up from the bag in her hands, and she takes a deep breath.

_What if she doesn’t celebrate Thanksgiving?_

_It’s all leftovers, what if she’s offended?_

_She’s so skinny, what if she’s on a diet?_

_What if she doesn’t want to see me?_

_What… what if she already has someone in there with her… another friend? A close friend?_

Diana knocks before her brain can convince herself to turn on her heel and flee. She’s a princess, dammit, the princess of some tiny island in the middle of a sea no one has ever heard of, but her mother didn’t raise a coward, and her aunt didn’t tutor a fool-

The door cracks open and a narrowed eye peeks out.

_“Diana?!”_

The door opens wider, revealing Isabel Maru in a pure white lab coat, goggles perched on her head, and some sinister looking metal rod in her gloved hand. Light spills into the hallway from the sterile room, and Diana squints.

“What are you _doing?”_ Isabel’s voice is faint. Even more faint than normal.

“I… I wanted…” But maybe her mother did raise a coward, because Isabel’s eyes are shining, and Diana has never seen anything so beautiful in her entire life, and all she can do is hold up the bag of food like an idiot, and then understanding dawns on Isabel’s face and she steps forward and wraps her arms around her, burying her goggled head in Diana’s jacket. And she’s warm, and she’s small, and so, so precious, and she fits perfectly against her, and it’s perfect, it’s just- perfect. And Diana wishes to God that she had seen this coming so then she could have put the damn food down and given Isabel a proper hug in return instead of this awkward, one armed embrace with a bag of food held out as far away as possible so she wouldn’t spill it on anything or anyone.

“You smell funny.” Isabel’s voice is muffled, but Diana winces.

“I know- Etta was trying to teach me how to smoke marijuana-”

 _“Weed?_ You dummy, and you let her?” Isabel raises her head to grin rather unkindly up at her, but her arms don’t loosen from around Diana’s middle, and Diana’s arm stays firmly around her back.

“She said it would help with the stress...”

“She’ll say anything, that one,” Isabel scoffs, loosening her grip at last, and Diana reluctantly lets her arm fall away. “If she _talked_ less, she would be less stressed-”

“Don’t be _mean_ ,” Diana says almost automatically. Isabel cackles.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” she replies, smirking. Diana blushes, and Isabel looks at her for a moment, then unloops the bag from Diana’s crooked fingers and steps into the lab. “Are you coming in?”

“May I?”

“No, stand outside in the dark like an idiot.”

“ _Isabel…”_

But Isabel has put the food down on some table, and she comes back to the doorway, seizes Diana’s arm, and then her lips are pressing against hers, and if that _hug_ was perfect, than this- _this_ is… is… And Diana stops trying to think as Isabel’s arms slide around the back of her neck and pull her even closer, and Diana’s hands settle onto Isabel’s hips, and the chemist gasps as Diana’s thumbs trace small circles, and her hands are pulling at Diana’s hair, making her moan softly, making her heart race, and she wants more, she wants it, she wants- she _needs_ -

The door shuts with a bang, and Diana jerks. Isabel looks at her strangely.

“I kicked it.”

“You… kicked it?” Diana says, her turn now to sound faint. Isabel is studying her stunned face with the intensity of some mad scientist studying a lab rat, and then she grins, takes her arm, and pulls her further into the room.

 

* * *

 

 _ **The Baroness** : _ _FUCK STOP IGNORING ME COME HOME MOM SAID IT’S OK_

Isabel’s phone buzzes as she goes off to fetch the eggnog, and Diana glances down at the brightly lit screen.

“That was your phone,” Diana says helpfully, and Isabel grumbles as she comes back to the table with carton.

“Here, take this,” she says absently to Diana, then she picks up her phone, snorts, and taps out a message, muttering to herself as she types. “Your… caps… lock… is... on.”

“Is someone worried about you?”

“Oh, my friend is worried I’m spending the night in the lab.”

“The night?”

“Yes. I usually do.”

“You could spend the night with me.”

Isabel raises her head and stares at her, an eyebrow crooked. And then Diana realizes what she said and looks away, blushing furiously. Isabel doesn’t break the silence, apparently enjoying Diana’s mortified expression.

“That’s very tempting,” she says smugly, reaching across the table to set a slightly soggy piece of cornbread onto Diana’s plate. “Very tempting _indeed.”_

 _“Isabel,_ that’s not what I meant _…_ ” Diana protests, and the chemist laughs.

“I told you, if people talked less, they would be less stressed. _You’re_ the one who keeps opening your pretty mouth and letting strange things come out.”

“I mean it though, if you need a place to sleep for a few hours…” _You can sleep in my bed. And I can sleep on the couch. Or wherever._

Isabel opens her mouth to reply, but her phone buzzes again and she glares down at it, then gives a barking laugh.

“I’m telling her I’m having a very nice dinner with a beautiful woman,” she says, taking a bite of food and tapping out her message.

“Is she really worried?”

“She’s a _terrible_ person,” Isabel replies, her mouth still full of cold potatoes. “Don’t worry about it.”

And so Diana tries to not worry.

 

* * *

 

It’s late, but Isabel refuses to leave the lab.

Diana asks her once whether she wants a ride home, and something flashes in the scientist’s eyes. Something akin to panic, something dangerous. And so she doesn’t ask again. She does ask again if Isabel wants to stay at her apartment, but she just gives a sideways smile, takes ahold of Diana’s jacket with both hands, and kisses her.

It’s every bit as electric as the first time.

And then Isabel pulls away half an inch and whispers, _No,_ against Diana’s lips, and that’s that.

Diana drives home in a daze. It’s almost lunchtime on Themyscira, but she only sends her mother a text message to let her know that she’s home safe, and then changes into a pair of warm pajamas, slips into bed, and wraps her arms tightly around one of her pillows.

She feels happy. She feels lonely. She feels everything at once.

She falls asleep and dreams that Isabel sneaks into her apartment in the middle of the night and snuggles into bed with her.

She’s disappointed when she wakes up in the morning and it’s not true.

 

* * *

 

The week after Thanksgiving is spent sitting in the library and the lab together: writing papers, finishing assignments, putting together presentations. Diana is snappish, and Isabel is generally silent.

_We could’ve chosen a better week for… this._

They don’t quite discuss what _this_ is. There’s not enough room in Diana’s brain to properly give that conversation the thought and attention it needs, at least not yet, not until finals are over. But in the library, Isabel will look at Diana over the table, and when their eyes meet, she will smile slightly, and then go back to her work. Or in the lab, as Diana crouches over her laptop, typing furiously, Isabel will come around and slide her arms around her middle and lay the side of her head against her back, and Diana will feel herself relax, just slightly, and then it’s onto the next paper, the next test to study for.

At some point, Diana finds out that Isabel lives with the friend who had texted her on Thanksgiving, and Diana whispers the word _Paula_ to herself for the rest of the day. But Isabel doesn’t elaborate on their relationship, except to flash a wicked smile when she says her name. Something twinges in Diana’s gut, but Hippolyta had never allowed her to give into jealousy as a child, and she wasn’t about to start up now.

At another point, Diana learns that Isabel doesn’t get stressed: she get sad. Diana pulls her own hair out, grumbles, paces, buries her head in her hands and groans. But Isabel shuts down. She doesn’t smile. She doesn’t talk. She doesn’t eat. She doesn’t respond.

And somehow, this is even more frightening than if she threw beakers across the room or slammed books onto tables.

 

* * *

 

The day before their English final, Diana texts Isabel to see if she needs a blue book because she has an extra one. Isabel doesn’t reply. A flicker of unease twists in Diana’s insides, but it’s not until she sends another message saying good night and still doesn’t get a reply that she starts to worry.

And then Isabel doesn’t show up for the final.

 

* * *

 

“Thanks, Diana. Have a good break.”

Diana’s phone is in her hand before her professor has even added her bluebook to the small stack on his desk. A door closes behind her as she stares at the glowing screen. No missed calls, no text messages, nothing.

_Isabel is gone. Isabel is gone. Isabel is gone._

“Are you Diana Prince?”

Diana spins around and finds herself face to face with a tall woman in a trench coat. She’s slouching, hands in her pockets, one foot against the wall.

“Yes?”

The woman looks her up and down, then raises an eyebrow. “She wasn’t kidding.”

“What?”

_“‘Why are you smiling so much, Isabel?’ ‘Oh, it’s nothing, there’s just this tall, beautiful goddess in my English class. And she broke into school on Thanksgiving and brought me food.’”_

“You’re her friend- Paula, right?” Diana asks, as if she hadn’t repeated that name to herself a hundred times, a thousand times since Thanksgiving. The woman doesn’t deign to answer.

“Isabel’s in the hospital. I thought you might-”

_“What?!”_

Diana’s voice is loud in the quiet hallway. Paula von Gunther shrugs, but before she can reply, the door behind her opens, and an exhausted looking student steps out.

“Hey, Diana, how’d you do?”

“I…” But she can’t answer. She can only stare wordlessly at the strange woman in front of her, waiting for her to speak, to explain herself: her presence, and Isabel’s absence.

“She aced it, who are you kidding?” Paula is snapping, and then she puts a hand on Diana’s arm and pulls her in the opposite direction. “Anyways, my mom’s with her now. I came here to tell you first.”

“What _happened?”_ Diana demands, finding her voice at last.

“We…” Paula hesitates, pushing straggles of hair away from her eyes, then says, “We found her on the bathroom floor this morning. There was blood everywhere.”

“Did someone _attack_ her?”

“...no?”

“Was she sick?”

“I mean, no, she wasn’t-”

“Then what _happened?”_

“She was _cutting,_ Diana, _Jesus,”_ Paula hisses, staring at her in disbelief. An awkward silence falls as the words meet uncomprehending ears, then the frustrated woman shakes her head and gestures towards the empty hallway. “Do you have another final? I mean, are you coming with me, or should I text you the address and her room number?”

“Of _course_ I’m coming with you,” Diana says, and then they are moving, she’s following as the blond woman shoves open the heavy glass doors and practically begins to run across the quad.

_But I don’t understand. I don’t know what you mean. I don’t understand what’s happening. What’s happened to you, Isabel, what did they do to you this time?_

But Diana doesn’t ask as Paula leads the way to the train station, and when they jump onto the Northbound train with barely 30 seconds to spare, Diana understands why they were in such a hurry. Once they’ve settled down on the blue, plasticky seats, and the college and city begin to speed by, Paula finally catches her breath and looks at Diana, her eyes gleaming.

“Anyways. It’s that time of year.”

Diana stares at her, feeling stupider by the moment. “Finals?”

“No, the anniversary of-” But her voice breaks off abruptly. “Never mind."

An awkward silence falls once more. Passengers get on, throw themselves into seats, and passengers get off, jumping from the train onto the platform. The train moves on.

“Is it because her sickness is getting worse?” Diana finally says. The train has already pulled in and out of three stations.

“She’s been getting worse,” Paula says, not looking away from the window. “I’ve been telling her for weeks to go see the doctor but she keeps saying her insurance won’t cover it, and some days she doesn’t even leave her room, and other days she doesn’t come home, and I love her to death- I love her, and I care about her, and I will never stop, but I’m tired of worrying about her. She needs help. ”

“Why… does she live with you?”

Paula lets out a humorless laugh.

“That’s a long story.” But she glances at Diana’s face and the hardness in her expression relaxes slightly. “Oh, you don’t have to worry about us. I just felt sorry for her and dragged her home with me one night, and my parents were okay with it. I mean, she used to live in the lab. Or in the train stations, or under the freeway-

“But _why?”_

“Well, she stayed with her aunt’s family after her parents kicked her out. But then she had to leave there, too.”

“...what?”

“She had to leave,” Paula repeats, looking at her strangely. “I think they moved to a smaller apart-”

“No, her parents, her _parents_ kicked her out? What could _possibly_ cause a family to abandon one of its own? To send a child, _their_ child to live with strangers, on the _streets?”_

Paula von Gunther blinks. And then she blinks again.

“Excuse me?” she says incredulously.

“What?”

“...you are her girlfriend, right? I picked up the right woman?”

“Yes?”

“Well, _fuck,”_ she snorts, a disbelieving smile curling her lip, and then she shakes her head, muffles a sniffle with her gloved hand, and looks again at the city buildings speeding past the windows.

“What?” Diana asks warily, unsure if she’s being cursed at, or if she should be comforting the woman sitting across from her.

 _“You,”_ Paula scoffs, absently brushing some lingering cigarette ash off of her coat- and brushing her hand across her eyes in the same motion. “Who _are_ you?”

“I’m Diana-”

“Yes, yes, but where are you _from,_ some desert island? Do they not have homophobes, or shitty parents, or minimum wage, or- or _money_ where you’re from?”

“Of course we-”

“Do you know _anything_ about her?”

“She told me about the disease-”

“About her _life._ About why someone that fucking smart is just finishing her Associates at twenty-six, about why she’s always in and out of the hospital, about why she cuts so much, about why we’re _here._ Hell, why are we even here, today, on this fucking train?”

“I…”

“Shit, woman, you don’t have to know everything about someone in order to love them, but- _oh,_ _Jesus Christ._ ”

And Paula throws up her hands and Diana thinks for a split-second that at last the woman is entirely disgusted with this conversation, but then she pulls a cell phone from her pocket and flips it open.

 _“Yes?_ ...I’m on the train, I _told_ you I wouldn’t be in for another two hours-”

And Diana looks out the window as Paula barks into her phone. They’ve just pulled into a station scattered with men and women in jackets and hats, earbuds in, feet aimlessly shuffling up and down the platform. They’re closer to the center of the city now, and one woman is carrying half a dozen shopping bags in one hand as she talks on her phone with the other. Diana can see the street from here- the cafes with their little tables and umbrellas, the locals walking their dogs, the cars driving up and down, flashes of sunlight bouncing off of their windows.

It’s a beautiful day.

“Fucking idiot,” Paula voice says, and Diana looks away to see her shoving her phone back into her pocket and tightening her grip on her backpack. She pauses a moment, that intense gaze of hers flitting over Diana’s face. “Look, about what I said, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-”

“No, you’re right. It’s just, we haven’t known each other for that long-”

“No, you haven’t. And it’s not my place to push you or anything like that. You care about her, and _God_ is she crazy about _you._ Just… please don’t hurt her. It sounds- I know it sounds stupid, but she's been through a lot. And I just…”

Her voice trails off, but she apparently decides against finishing her thoughts. Diana opens her mouth to make some useless statement, but Paula abruptly claps her on the shoulder, and then stands and swings on her backpack.

They’ve arrived at their station.

 

* * *

 

“She’s going to be pretty drugged up. I’m just warning you.”

Paula von Gunther only says one thing to her between the entire trip from the automatic doors of the train to the doorway of Room 113. She spoke to other people- snapping at the receptionist at the front desk who asked five times if they were relatives of the patient, growling at the doctor who nearly tripped into them as they stepped out of the elevator onto the linoleum floor, muttering curses as she pushed past crowds of frazzled staff and arguing family members.

_Why are they crying? They’re here to get help, why are they all so sad? Why are they so angry?_

But Diana doesn’t ask, and Paula doesn’t answer.

Room 113 is dark and musty. The first bed is occupied by someone who is not Isabel: a motionless figure with a neck brace. He is lying too deep in the shadows for Diana to see his face; the blinking lights from the machinery beside the bed pulse against the swell of his blanket-covered body.

“Fuck these kids,” Paula mutters, either forgetting that they had left the clamor of the hallway, or not caring that anyone might hear. She strolls forward into the room, then pulls aside the curtain around the second bed.

Isabel is asleep. Her hair is loose, spread out behind her head like dark sunlight. The covers are pulled up to her chin, but her right arm rests atop the light blue sheets. Her wrist and forearm are heavily bandaged.

_Oh, Isabel, what did they do to you?_

“Good, Mom left the cookies.”

Paula leans over the tray table beside the bed, needlessly lifting said ziplock of cookies in her hand and then dropping it back onto the surface. Diana moves forward, barely hearing, her eyes fixed on Isabel’s face. Her lips are parted slightly as she sleeps, and her eyelashes are so long, Diana could swear they’re brushing against the sharp cheekbones.

 _“Isabel...”_ Diana leans down and presses a kiss against the woman’s forehead. Her skin is cold, clammy. “Isabel, it’s me.”

Her voice cracks on the last syllable, and Diana closes her eyes, then looks at the bandaged arm. And she sits down. And then there is silence, broken only by the echoes of distant voices in the hall, and the low hum of the machinery in this room.

“What does that mean?” Her voice sounds intrusive as it interrupts the quiet.

“What?” Paula von Gunther asks warily.

“That word you used. Cutting.”

“Well, don’t use it in here, _God,_ woman,” Paula snorts. She fiddles with the bag of cookies for a moment, then apparently makes some resolve and comes around the bed, leaning down so then her mouth is brushing against Diana’s ear. Her clothes smell the same as Isabel’s, but she’s wearing some sweet, lemony perfume that curls up into Diana’s nose. Paula pauses for a moment, her hand reaching out to steady herself against the railing on the bed. And then she whispers to her, and tells her what Isabel did to herself.

And Diana cries.

 

* * *

 

“I’m sorry.”

It’s the first thing Isabel Maru says when she opens her eyes and sees Diana staring back at her.

“You don’t have to apologize to me,” Diana replies. Isabel’s fingers twitch against hers, and that familiar smirk crosses her face.

“You don’t have to be so careful. It’s still me, just a change of scenery.”

Diana tries to smile, and Isabel rolls her eyes, then glances groggily around the room.

“She always does that.”

“What?”

“The cookies,” she replies, reaching out and pulling the bag from the table, opening it deftly with one hand. She takes one for herself and offers another to Diana.

“No, they’re for you.”

“This one is for _you,”_ Isabel says, shaking it slightly. The sleeve of her hospital gown falls down her wrist, and Diana catches a glimpse of her arm, the arm that had always, always before been covered with long sleeves.

_But why? Why would she do such a thing, cause herself pain, give herself scars like this?_

_Sometimes… it’s the only way to know you’re alive. That you have control over something._

“I thought of you, you know.”

The glimmer of teasing has left Isabel’s eyes. Diana takes the cookie, carefully not looking at her.

“You don’t have to talk about-”

“And I tried to stop.”

Diana closes her eyes. The cookie is still pressed against her lips. It smells like chocolate and dough and home. She takes a shaky breath.

“...Diana?”

“I know you did.”

 

* * *

 

They discharge her at six in the evening, after hours of waiting for a doctor to stroll into the room, glance over the machinery, ask Isabel how she feels, and then walk right back out again. The nurses want to keep her for a week for “treatment”, but Isabel mutters something about insurance, and they hand her the bill and allow her to leave. Diana called a taxi, and it’s waiting when they emerge from the hospital, Isabel taking uncertain, shuffling steps, her body still muddled with medication.

“You don’t have to do this.”

“I know.”

“Then why are you?”

Diana closes Isabel’s door for her, then jogs around the back of the cab to get into the other side. She confirms the address for her apartment with the driver, then leans back and glances at Isabel. The woman is still staring at her.

_Oh, Isabel…_

And Diana wants to reach out and touch her cheek, or her hair, or her shoulder, or her beautiful, beautiful hands. But she doesn’t. She just stares at her, and Isabel stares back, and the taxi lurches forward into traffic.

“Diana?”

“You know why.”

 

* * *

 

Diana is so late to her Skype session with her mother, the proud woman actually looks worried when her daughter finally logs on, apologizing profusely.

“What happened to you?”

“Nothing happened to me.”

Hippolyta leans forward, her eyes narrowed, and Diana stumbles over her words.

“I mean nothing happened to _me,_ I was at the hospital with Isabel all day.”

“What happened to her? Is she all right?”

“I…” Diana glances behind her at the closed door to her bedroom. “She’s here. She’s resting.”

“What happened?”

“I… she hurt herself.”

“What? How?”

And Diana stares at the keyboard and doesn’t answer.

“...Diana?”

“I don’t really, I mean...”

Hippolyta stares, her expression becoming more and more incredulous, then she pulls off her headphones and tosses them impatiently onto the desk.

“Antiope, talk to your niece.”

And Diana raises her eyes as her aunt steps into the frame.

“Hello, child.”

“Antiope.”

_My mother didn’t raise a coward, my aunt didn’t tutor a fool…_

“What hurts?”

It is such an easy question. A question Antiope had asked her thousands of times on the training field. _My elbow. My knee. My thumb. My shoulder. My ankle._

“I don’t know. My… my brain.”

“Have you eaten today?”

“No, not yet, I just got home-”

“Go eat.”

“I’m not hung-”

“Diana.”

And Diana pulls out her earbuds, pushes herself away from the desk, and walks to the kitchen without another word. It’s finals week, and she still has odds and ends of last-minute meals, but she scoops a cup of dry oatmeal into a bowl, douses it in water, and tosses it into the microwave. A sliced banana and spoonful of brown sugar are dumped into the steaming slop two minutes later. And then she almost drops the entire thing as she steps back into the living room.

Isabel is sitting in her chair, her headphones in her ears, apparently having an animated conversation with Antiope.

“...because we just got back from the hospital and- oh, hello, Diana.”

“Did you want anything?”

“No, I’m good.”

“There’s hot water, too, if you want tea.”

Isabel rises, waves goodbye to Antiope, hands Diana her earbuds, then kisses her cheek and walks away.

A long silence stretches as Diana eats and avoids Antiope’s gaze. Granted, she is hungrier than she realized.

“She’s very sweet. And very wounded.”

Diana swallows and finally looks up. Antiope is watching her, and her eyes are not steely or wary, but thoughtful. Pensive.

“I like her.”

And there it is. Three simple words of validation, after weeks of Steve and Etta making fun of her, weeks of Isabel herself questioning why Diana is even looking at her, and today’s conversation with Paula about Isabel being exhausting…

“I’m not crazy?”

“Oh, no, you’re crazy, all right,” Antiope says, smiling. “But that’s what love is suppose to do, isn’t it?”

 

* * *

 

_“I’m sorry.”_

The next day, Isabel emerges from the bedroom, yawning. She’s dressed in one of Diana’s shirts and yoga pants with the bottoms rolled up. Her hair is a mess.

“Will you stop apologizing?” Diana asks, rising from her computer. Isabel backs away.

 _Like a scared puppy,_ Diana thinks, immediately sitting back down.

“Come here,” she says softly. Isabel walks across the living room to her, and Diana keeps beckoning her closer until she’s close enough to pull sideways onto her lap.

“What are you doing?” Isabel grumbles, wrapping one arm around Diana’s shoulders, keeping the other arm close to her side.

“Saying good morning.” And she brushes the hair out of Isabel’s eyes and looks up at her. Her other hand is secure against the smaller woman’s waist. “Look at you, you’re so tall now.”

“So _this_ is what the top of your head looks like,” Isabel says slyly, her hand sneaking up from Diana’s back to pat her hair.

Diana grins and buries her face in Isabel’s neck, and she closes her eyes and Isabel rests her cheek against the side of her head. And for a long moment, they sit, leaning against each other, breathing.

_I’m so glad you’re here._

Diana presses her lips against Isabel’s throat, and the woman’s breath hitches. But her arm tightens around Diana’s back, pulling her closer. And then she raises her hand, the one still in bandages. And Diana closes her eyes as gentle fingers trail down her cheek, over her lips, under her chin.

_“Isabel…”_

Diana’s voice is barely a whisper, a breath, low and heavy with longing. A cold finger pushes teasingly against Diana’s nose, then the arm falls away once more.

“What did that woman tell you?”

“What woman?”

“Paula, yesterday.” And despite it being quiet, there is an edge to Isabel’s voice, and Diana opens her mouth, then closes it.

“She didn’t tell me anything we need to talk about now. Or ever, if you don’t want to,” she says, reaching out to touch her fingertips. The bandaged arm moves forward, Isabel’s hand sliding under Diana’s.

“Do you have any questions?”

 _A hundred questions. A thousand._ Diana traces Isabel’s palm lines with her thumb. Lines that are so similar and so different from those that chase each other beneath the white bandages.

_What did they do to you?_

_Why did you do it?_

_What triggered it, what made you do this to yourself, what made you hurt yourself?_

_What did they do to you?_

_What did your parents say to you, when they threw you out of their house?_

_What did you say to them?_

_Have you seen them since?_

_What did they do to you, Isabel Maru?_

“Diana?”

“I… want you to know that you don’t have to hide,” Diana says, moving her head so then she can look the woman in the face. Isabel doesn’t meet her eyes. “You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to, but you don’t have to hide. You don’t have to wear a mask for me, you don’t have to hide these scars. I… I want you to know that I’ll get scared, but I won’t get scared off. I won’t leave unless you really want me to, and not a moment before.”

Isabel’s hand is tense beneath Diana’s. She can hear their hearts beating, feel them both breathing, almost in sync. Seconds pass.

“Why would you say that? You barely know me,” Isabel finally says, her voice sounding small in the silence.

“I want to know you. I want to be with you.”

“What if you change your mind?”

“I won’t.”

“What if I change my mind?”

“Then we’ll talk about it… We’ll deal with it, we’ll figure it out. I want this. I want you.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“You don’t _have_ to believe me,” Diana insists, leaning back slightly and gently raising Isabel’s chin so then they are eye to eye. “You just have to trust me. Here. Today. And tomorrow we’ll deal with tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that, and the day after _that_ , until there are no more tomorrows.”

And Isabel stares back at her, and her eyes are shiny with tears.

“It’s not that easy.”

And Diana pulls her close, and she kisses her. It’s a soft kiss. A tender kiss. And Isabel kisses her back.

“No one said anything about easy.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> First off, THANK YOU for reading! I've never posted a really long single chapter fic like this before, so thank you SO much for sticking around. 
> 
> Second, thank you to my WonderPoison partner in crime, miss_belivet. Thank you for listening to me complain about this story for months, and please accept this (late) Christmas gift. ;)
> 
> Third, this fic is a little love letter to my hometown (and the community college I went to when I lived there). If I could relive any time in my life again, it would be Fall 2010. *happy sigh*
> 
> Fourth, this fic was actually supposed to be quite a bit longer, but this chapter was as long as I wanted to make it, so we'll see if I'm up for actually writing the next two chapters/semesters. (That's where all the angst is, really).


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